Broken Treaties
by WElle
Summary: Sequel to Blood Ties. Takes place during Dead Man's Blood. There is more at stake than the Colt.
1. Chapter 1

He opens the door to his motel and finds her sitting in a chair lit by a single lamp. John immediately curses himself for not being more careful. Then again, he knows on his best day he's no match for one of the Daughters. _Thank God it's just Lilly_, he thinks. Then instantly thinks better of feeling lucky. Knowing she knows now, he's probably not altogether out of danger.

"I have always admired your gall, John Winchester." She says coolly.

"Yeah, well, what can I say?" He closes the door behind him, scans the room for signs of anyone else, still not sure this is going to end with him _not _bleeding from somewhere.

"Start with wear you get the nerve to ask for my help."

"So, no polite chit chat?" He dumps his duffle bag on the bed.

"What for?" She is perfectly still and he has to admit it's pretty disconcerting, "We're family after all. Speaking of which, what should I call you now? Step Dad? Pop?"

"What do you want from me, Lilly?" He's got bigger issues right now and he's never been a good emotional punching bag. Whether or not he deserved it.

"What do I want? I want to dangle you by the ankle over an open pit of snakes." She hisses. Unnervingly, he can and does picture her doing it. She finally stands, "You're awfully lucky that looking for an open pit of snakes is really not a productive use of our time this evening."

She steps toward the door, "You're their mess to clean up. Don't lie to them and don't brush them off. You owe them that at the _very_ least."

She's right and he has nothing to say to that.

"I don't know where he is, Lilly." He offers, a small token, he knows.

"I didn't ask."

He must look puzzled because she shoots him a look that by all rights should leave him with bruises, "It will be a long time before I believe a fucking word out of either your mouth or my father's." He thinks of his sons and wonders if their next meeting will be this cold. The regrets, old and new, swirl around him like they always do.

She stops in the open doorway, "Well? Are you coming? I thought we had work to do."


	2. Chapter 2

"Vampires." Lilly states matter-of-factly. She's cased the house and the surrounding woods of Daniel Elkins' property. Not a particularly difficult task, the vampires weren't exactly subtle. For a group this close to extinction she finds it almost amusing that they should be so arrogant about killing a hunter. "Half bloods."

John looks stunned. "Vampires? I thought they were extinct." He looks back up at the house.

"The half bloods are close." She loads her kit back into the truck. "For the time being. But they'll bounce back, they always do."

"What do you mean?" He asks.

"What do you mean, what do I mean?" She watches him as he tries to sort this out, confused by his obvious ignorance. "I thought that's why you called me here."

His silence in the truck on the ride over to the Elkins house was a blessing. She didn't trust herself to speak. She sat, feeling trapped in the passenger side of the car, wondering what the hell to say to the man beside her. She'd known him, in passing at least, for over a decade. He'd hunted with Nick. He'd been a guest in her father's house. Certainly his reputation preceded him. But more importantly now, most importantly now, he was the other half of the giant secret her own father had been keeping from her for she didn't know how long. John Winchester was the father of her newly found brothers. Her mother's sons. The mother who had left her and her father when she was barely two years old and disappeared.

His silence now only means she being played. And she's been played enough.

"John…" Her voice is a low growl. Her last visit with Dean and Sam introduced her to John's less than open way of dealing with his sons and their 'family business'. Lilly has never been a fan of 'need to know' information mongering, and being on the receiving end of the intelligence blackout just pisses her right off. She takes a breath and uses the voice, her every-so-reasonable on the outside don't-fuck-with-me on the inside voice, "OK, this is how this is going to work. You will tell me everything and I mean e-ver-y-thing about why I'm here or I'm leaving."

"Just like that, you'd leave a nest of vampires?" He challenges her.

"Two minutes ago you didn't know they existed." She counters, "So obviously there is something else going on here. Big enough to call for my help. Just like that you'd let me walk away?"

She watches him consider this for a second, apparently it's a harder decision than it should be, "Vampires just killed a friend of mine, a Legacy friendly hunter."

"Again: _And_?"

"Isn't that enough?"

"You and Elkins haven't spoken in a decade. Your sudden concern would be heartwarming, if it weren't total bullshit." He should know she's done her homework.

"William Sloane won't like it." John overplays his hand a bit, dragging the head of the Legacy into this, she thinks.

"Why not? You're a capable hunter. You're here." She leaves out the part where she would just find the nest, finish off the vampires and leave without anyone knowing she was here by tomorrow night anyway. "Certainly the great John Winchester can handle a wee nest of Halflings. Unless there's some other reason he's here."

He turns his head back and forth between her and the house. "We need to check the house."

"_You_ need to check the house. I need to get a flight home." She starts to get into the truck.

"Lilly. Please. This is," he leans on the word, "important."

A nasty retort sits on the tip of her tongue. Her father is involved in this, she just knows it. But the accusations and stinging commentary dry up on her lips. They hear the rumbling of a car in the distance, getting closer. The truck is hidden in the wood north of the house, at the bottom of hill, secluded from the view of the approaching vehicle, but her and John's view is equally limited and they can't tell who's arrived.

She and John exchange a glance and each silently heads back toward the house.

Half an hour later they're both back at the truck. "Did you call them here?" she demands.

"No." He shakes his head, shakes the new falling snow off himself. "I don't want them anywhere near here."

_Fucking surprise_. She manages to use her inside voice. "Too late. They're inside."

John's gaze is firmly pinned to the house. They watch for signs of flashlights in windows, both praying silently that neither of the men in the house does anything to give themselves away. They both breathe a sigh of relief when they seem them exit in a hurry, with a purpose.

"What did they find?" She demands of him.

"The Colt." He looks her in the eye, for a change. "I hope."

She stares at him. _Goddamit_. "We follow them for the time being. I think the vampires are long gone, but…just to be safe." She concedes. Her stomach sinking further and further as they pull out to follow Sam and Dean.


	3. Chapter 3

Sam is speechless, excited, anxious, apprehensive, all of it following John's truck to the motel room. _Dad's back, just like that. Again. For how long this time?_

Dean's lit up from the inside. Sam's not sure whether to hold it against him or not. For the last few months, he's watched his big brother vacillate between being furious at his father and desperately worried. He's watched him struggle with the existence of their sister. He's watched him with an older more observant eye. Truth be told, Sam's watched Dean his entire life, but it's the first time he thinks he's _seeing_ him. Whatever else, it's good to see him happy.

He stops himself staring at Dean's profile knowing a smart ass response is the only thing it will get him.

They pull into the motel parking lot in time to see their father climb out of the truck. Followed by Lilly.

Part of Sam thinks he should have known. He thinks he should learn to stop being surprised.

She waves at them briefly, then just walks away in the direction of the motel office.

"What the hell is she doing here?" Dean's light mood fades before Sam's eyes and it's all the youngest Winchester can do not to sigh out loud.

They get out of the Impala and file into the motel room behind their father.

"What's she doing here?" Dean questions his father without making it the whole way through the door.

"I called her." Sam has always thought that John's deep baritone and his clipped one liners go together like air and breathing.

Dean stands, incredulous, with his hands hanging to his sides, eyes opening wider, beckoning an explanation. John stands still offering none.

"How long have you know?" Sam asks.

"A while."

"How long?" Sam demands.

"Derek Rayne found me about fifteen years ago." John hasn't moved a hair and Sam's frustration bounces off him like the wall he is.

"Fifteen years? You've known about our _sister_ for fifteen years and you don't say a word?"

Dean is silent this whole time. Unflinching, looking at his shoes in a way Sam knows is him just thinking, just deciding what to say. Deciding if there is anything to say.

"I couldn't." John answers.

"Wouldn't." Sam practically spits. "You wouldn't."

"Sam." Dean's voice is low. "Stop."

"Dean, come on." He turns on his brother, his hands in the air, questioning, begging, beckoning, "_Fifteen_ years."

"Sam just stop." Dean finally looks up. The look on his face, the blankness, the paleness, does stop Sam and he's silent just long enough that the momentum of his anger is flattened. They stand, this threesome, looking back and forth between one another. Silent.

John finally clears his throat. "Thank you." He puts his hand on Sam's shoulder, "For the Daevas, thank you." Just like that Sam is seven years old again, launching himself into his father's arms as he comes through the door three days later than he said he would from a hunt. Just grateful his dad is alive, in front of him.

The knock on the door is quiet and they all stare toward it for a few seconds before Dean finally moves.

"Hi." She stands in the doorway, looking to Sam so much like his brother. So much like she should be part of this family. So far from it at the same time.


	4. Chapter 4

"Hi." Dean avoids her gaze, but steps out of the way to let her in. "I'm three doors down, 112."

To say 'silence descended' is a bit dramatic, but he definitely has a better appreciation for the term now. He doesn't know how long they stand there, looking at each other, Still Life with Dysfunctional Family, but Lilly, mercifully, breaks the tension.

"What condition is Elkins' house in?" She asks him.

"The inside's a mess." Dean answers.

"Cocky." She shakes her head, "If they're careless enough to go after a hunter, or too stupid to know Elkins was one, they probably left something to track them by. I'll go back and see if I can find anything."

"We didn't see anything." Dean's mind begins to drive, going over everything he saw, every sign, every trace. He could have sworn he'd been careful. Now his stomach sinks, he feels the weight of his father's stare. Dean fills in the blanks of what John sees, finds himself wanting in his version of his father's point of view.

Does she read his mind, he wonders. Her answer is dismissive, but not of him, rather of the possibility that he'd done something wrong. "You didn't know what to look for." If he'd let himself indulge, it would probably feel nice, but he feels his father's stare again and he does what he always does when he thinks he comes up short. Hides behind his wise ass.

"Let me guess, not your first time?"

She just smiles and winks.

"I'll come." Sam offers.

_Cut and run, Sammy? At least you won't be fighting with Dad_. Dean forces himself not to shake his head. He thinks maybe Lilly notices because she turns and stands beside him before she answers their brother. "I'll be faster on my own, Sam."

John's gaze on them is heavy again and appraising. It's uncomfortable and Dean would give up a night, or four, with a slutty redhead, or four, to make him stop staring that way. Stop staring full stop. _Lilly to the rescue again_, he's a bit in awe when she turns to the old man and manages equally without sarcasm or warmth to say, "Anyway, I'm sure you lot have a great deal to discuss." It seems to take the momentum out of Sam's request and the sting out John's stare at the same time.

"Can you get into the county records?" She turns to Sam.

"Probably." Sam's hurt feelings seem to already be forgotten.

"Check property records. Anything empty or abandoned. Nothing with construction on it. Local missing persons files as well..." She asks, politely, not ordering, maybe that's why Sam never seems to get ruffled by her. Dean's been wondering a lot lately how to accomplish that. Then he wonders if it grinds his father that Sam listens to her and not him. All of this serves to make his shoulders tighter.

Sam's face does that thing it does when he's onto something, "See if they fit into a radius around any property?"

"Exactly." She zips up her coat and slips on gloves and tosses Sam her room key. "There's a portable internet connection in my room."

"Call if you find anything." John orders her. Sort of.

"You too." She turns her back and starts to leave, then turns around, fixes John with a stare Dean has never seen anyone get away with, "Do not go after them yourselves." She looks at Dean, "Please."

He nods and watches her leave, hears her get into what must be her rental car and drive off. Sam immediately takes off for her room. Dean and John are left looking at each other.

"You got something you want to say?" John asks. The question is rhetorical, of course. The only appropriate answer is _No, sir, _and Dean very nearly, almost automatically, gives it to him, but his mouth has a mind of its own.

"Does she look like mom?" He's surprised to find he doesn't regret himself asking even though the answer is obvious, the question merely goading.

John stares at the door she left through and clears his throat, "I'm going to clean up. Once Sammy's done on the computer, you guys should get some rest while you can."

It's not like Dean was expecting an answer, but it makes him angry nonetheless when John grabs his shaving kit and heads for the bathroom. He stands with his arms crossed staring his father down. Feels the slightest victory when he hears, "A little."


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Note: I added this chapter as a 'Thank You' for Renniespice's unflaggingly encouraging reviews. Thanks, chick. Hope this is what you wanted.**

John deliberately doesn't slam the bathroom door behind him. Deliberately measures his breathing. Deliberately turns on the police scanner. Deliberately lays out his shaving kit. Deliberately turns the hot water on to practically scalding and deliberately does not smash his head repeatedly on the questionable bathroom tile once he's stripped and under the water.

_Does she look like mom?_

_A little._

A little painfully. A little exactly.

She looks so much like her mother it usually takes John's breath away. Mary's girl. Mary's grown woman, he almost laughs to himself, positive Lilly isn't anybody's little anything. It took years to be able to look at her without wanting to cry or choke on the lump in his throat, to get over the near heart attack he'd had the first time he'd seen her. To be able to see her with her own daughter without his heart breaking thinking, _Mary's granddaughter_. He'd gotten used to the occasional sight of her. He'd talked himself into Lilly's resemblance to Derek. He'd managed to convince himself over time that this was nothing to be angry at his darling, his beloved, his angel Mary about.

But the sight of her next to Dean undoes him. They have the same eyes, the same colouring, the same tiny cleft in their bottom lips. The same set to their worried brows. They both placate Sammy. They each look to the next youngest like a precious object. They are both, in their way, the oldest. They are by no means twins. Dean's cheekbones are higher, her skin is more perfect. Dean's stubbornness is a bit more goofy, hers more like obsidian, his confidence is practiced, hers bread into her. He is rough, she is refined. But they are both most definitely Mary's. It makes him weak, because in that moment when she and Dean were standing side by side, John new more clearly than ever how much he sees Mary in both Mary's little girl and boy. Standing next to Dean, Lilly shatters the at best tenuous hold he has on his feelings for his wife. He is confused, he is angry, he is still so painfully in love and painfully grieving for her that he doesn't even try to stop the weeping, the silent sobs that rack him so hard he almost throws up. He knows he will never move on.

He knows that he and Derek did the right thing keeping the children apart. He knows in his heart of hearts it was best for everyone. Most of all for himself and for Derek. But still he wonders sometimes. How would his sons, his sweet, angry, damaged sons have turned out with her around? With the Legacy around? Would Sam have stayed if he'd known about others like him, others who counted this life as normal? Would Dean have left knowing there were others to shoulder the responsibility? Would the thing that killed Mary have used her daughter to get to her sons or the other way around? The questions swirl in the steam and he allows himself his few minutes of violent self pity before pulling himself together.

John swipes his hand across the foggy mirror, stares at his red eyes. He wishes he'd brought the bottle in here with him, then Dean and Sam could, would, put his red wet eyes down to Jack. They did the right thing, he tells himself again. Without knowing why Mary had done what she'd done he and Derek had to assume there was a purpose. They had to assume that a Daughter of the Order, doesn't walk out on her life and disappear without a sign or word to anyone without a reason. Doesn't start another life with a new name a new identity, a new family, doesn't leave another family behind just to be cruel. Doesn't die at the hands of the things the Daughters train their whole live to fight, by coincidence.

John dresses but stays in the steamy bathroom until his breathing isn't ragged. He exits only when he can hear that Sam is back and typing away on his laptop, Dean needling him about where to look. He walks out without a look at either of them and crosses to where the bottle actually is, because now he needs a drink to look at his boys. He needs not to cry again, even if this time it would be in gratitude at the sight of them sprawled on the beds of a crappy motel, side by side, bickering like the old days.

"I'm getting food." He tosses the police scanner to Dean, "Keep your ears open."

"For what?" His oldest doesn't question orders, isn't now. He's asking for the best way to follow them. It's easier, but it breaks his heart a little too. _Christ, this is going to be along night_, he thinks.

"You'll know it when you hear it." He throws his jacket over his shoulders, "Cheeseburger?" Dean nods, "Burger, no onions?" Sam nods without looking up.

_Thank God for that_, John thinks.


	6. Chapter 6

Lilly has tracked the Vampires all night and knows she's close to the nest. She's freezing, she's filthy and now she's got a raging headache after finding an abandoned, burned out car in a patch of woods, hidden a few hundreds yards in from the side of the road. She steps onto the asphalt, focuses her eyes on the yellow divider lines, uses the black light instead of the flash light and follows the trail of clues from the road to the car and back. Skid marks; faint, light foot prints; blood trails, just narrow lines of tiny droplets the police would never find because they wouldn't be looking for anything this specific.

_This is how they fhunt. _She thinks_. They lure them from the road, don't run them off it. _Her thoughts are like bullet points, produced, catalogued, organized as they appear. _The car left skid marks, like sharp breaking, but not swerving. The blood drops, few as there are, begin here and lead to the patch of open wood beside the end of the skid marks. They took the human prey out of the car, probably picked the car up themselves and dropped it in the woods where they burned it. No tire tracks, no reason for anyone to enter further. At worst it looks like a car breaked to avoid an animal._ She walks back to where the fire was, around the shell of the vehicle. More blood here. Burned blood and fresh, she can smell it. They fed on at least one person. _Dinner by the fire_, she thinks wryly, shudders as the picture forms in her mind.

She has found four similar feeding spots, had followed the tire tracks leading from Elkins to the west and drove up and down along this country road until she saw the signs of small congregations. A strewn bottle. Cigarette butts. The odd tooth. Some with a lingering smell of blood, some with none. Bent twigs and shrubbery - not enough to alert a layperson, but a hunter, certainly a Daughter, could recognize the signs. This is the first burned out car. She turns her attention back to it. The interior must have been too bloody to leave and too bloody to take with them. The rest of the cars she thinks were drawn in to what ever trap the vampires had laid and were taken with the human prey, kept by the nest. _Not enough to be murders, they have to party over the bodies and steal from them too._ _Classy,_ she thinks sarcastically. No wonder the pure blood vampires, the vampire nobles, look down on the half bloods.

She back tracks east of the Elkins place and finds two more possible spots. East or west she isn't sure, but the nest will be off this road. She'll bet her favourite shoes on it. They may have done just enough to cover their tracks, but this nest is lazy. Six feeding spots on a single road, they don't vary their pattern, don't do enough to hide from hunters. There may be similar scenes further out, off other roads, but she doubts it. Still, she'll check tonight to be thorough.

Dawn begins to rise. The sky lightens just a bit and she realizes she'd better get back. She hadn't seen a single other soul in the darkness, but a tired, mud covered woman in the middle of the road would probably get someone's attention in daylight. She turns away from the woods to head to her car when she sees it. Just a tiny white nub poking out of burned earth beneath the car. Another tooth. Not human. Not animal. Not half blood.

_Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit. _

To any onlooker, Lilly looks calm, pensive, appraising. She bends down at the knees gracefully, examines the fang, turns it over in her hand, like an archeologist. She takes a deep breath and stops the spasm that wants to fly loose through her. Feels her face pale, her blood drop from her chest to her feet. Her heart pounds and the only reason her hands don't shake is from years of training them not to.

Lilly calls John, manages not to swear into the phone when it goes past two rings.

"Find them?" he fires.

"Where are you?"

"Motel. What's going on?" John's voice is clear, military, instantly alert.

"Don't move until I get there. Don't go after anyone or anything until I'm with you." She's met with the silence of grinding mental gears. _Fuck bossy_, she appeals to his alpha male side, makes her voice distinctly feminine, worried, "John, please, trust me. I'll explain when I get there. Just don't move and don't let them go anywhere."

"How long?"

"Thirty minutes."

She clips her phone shut and stands for a long moment staring at the fang between her fingers.

_Purebloods._


	7. Chapter 7

They wait for her in a motel room that is too small to contain them. Too small to contain John's anxious need to get his hands on the Colt. He doesn't pace, he doesn't move from the chair. He isn't moving a muscle but he fills the space. He adopts his serious, still face, the one that doesn't entertain discussion and for a change even Sammy isn't pestering him about what this is all about. No, Sammy is hovering by the window, waiting for her. Dean is on the bed sharpening a knife deliberately _not_ waiting for her.

John could have guessed, could have perfectly predicted his son's reactions to Lilly. There was a time he thought he'd never be able to understand Sam, but there are things that are eternal. His youngest is puppy when it comes to people. The more to play with, the happier he is. Dean puts on a good face, a charm smile, but his oldest is happier on his own, with his family, where things are the same. Sammy can't get enough of people. Could make friends with convicts on a firing line.

He doesn't expect her to be muddy when she comes through the door. It helps. Mary was never muddy. Mary was one of those women who took care of herself in a careless way. She never had to try. Her hair was always soft, her skin was always perfect, she always smelled…he didn't have a word for it, she smelled pretty. In his eyes Lilly had always been more sophisticated, one of those women who always look after themselves. Manicured, polished, well spoken. Mud covered Lilly served to remind him she was also all business, part of this serious business, which at least in his memory, Mary never was.

"This has become more complicated." She almost sits on an unmade bed, but stops herself short and begins to pace. "What do you know about vampires?" She looks to John first, then to Dean, then to Sam.

"That apparently they're not imaginary." Dean quips.

"Just legends. Light, crosses. Some old history about Vlad the Impaler."

Sam offers.

"John?"

"Not much. A bit of what Elkins told me. That daylight, crucifixes, holy water are all crap." He sits back on a bed and leans forward, elbows on knees, like an anxious student.

"Yes and no. Holy water and crucifixes are old wives tales. Some can't tolerate daylight, some can to a degree. Depends what kind they are."

"Kind?" Dean mimics his father's posture from the other bed.

"There are two…species, if you will, of vampires. Purebloods and halfbloods. Elkins hunted halfbloods. The vast majority of hunters do. They are stronger, a bit faster, self healing, blah blah blah. Vastly stupid, as a rule. The need to feed regularly and we are their favourite meal. Purebloods are different altogether and you can't kill them."

"They're immortal?" John asks.

"It's forbidden." She answers solemnly.

Dean looks dumbstruck, John is dumbstruck and, for once, he's thankful for Sam's inability to reign it in.

"What do you mean forbidden. By whom? If these things kill people, why can't we hunt them?" Lilly just lets his mouth run until he's finished.

"They don't kill people." She answers.

Sam drops heavily onto the mattress beside his father and she continues, "Among purebloods, there are thirteen vampire nations. Each is governed by a ruling house. The ruling houses are banded together and form a council. The Legacy maintains treaties, has maintained peace treaties with the ruling council for eight hundred years."

Sam starts to interrupt, but she stops him with a look, "Let me finish, then ask anything you like."

He nods.

"Purebloods are the original vampire. They are born, not turned. They don't require human blood to survive, they don't need to feed on us, they don't need us to reproduce. They are stronger and far more powerful than halfbloods, their strength increases with age and the vast majority of them are ancient."

"Stronger than you?" Dean asks. "The Daughters, I mean."

"Much."

"Then why don't they just destroy us?" Sam's turn.

"They're not evil, Sam. They don't want to. Mostly." She continues to pace.

"Mostly?" John prompts.

"There are those among them, who would see us all as servants. Entertainment. Dinner." She sighs looks into John's eyes, "Just like us. There are those of us who would see other humans reduced to slaves."

"Were they ever human?" Sam asks.

"Yes. The original vampires were all halfbloods. They are believed to have come from Romania. Evidence indicates that a snow bound village, two or three thousand years ago, was ravaged by a blood bourne virus. Cattle died, poultry. They ran out of food and as these things go, the villagers turned to cannibalism, passing the virus amongst themselves almost completely. The virus attacks DNA, changing it, mutating it within an individual, unheard of evolutionarily. It changed them into half animals. Proto-vampires. There was…shall we say _interbreeding_ with the humans, over several generations. Because this village was so isolated, over the next hundred years or so the mutated DNA and human mixed, recombined and eventually produced a creature with almost entirely human form. But with sanguinate diet, altered musculature and almost infinite longevity."

"What?" Dean interjects.

John flashes back to when Sammy was a teenager. Dean was always faster, stronger...older. It was one of his only weapons, rubbing in how much smarter he was than Dean. One of the few things he had over his big brother. It bothered John to see it. He knew it was only brotherly teasing, but all the same, to know what Dean could have become.

Sam must have rolled his eyes at the question because John looks up at the sound of a half playful swat across Sam's shoulder. He's heartened, moved if he'd allow himself to admit, to see Lilly sit beside Dean, as though taking his side. She answers him earnestly.

"They subsist on blood, are very strong and live until they're killed, they don't age."

"I thought you said they didn't drink blood." Sam is calm, dissecting. He will make a good lawyer, John thinks proudly.

"They don't drink _our_ blood. _Anymore._ They drink animal blood."

"If they're so much stronger than us and drink blood, why didn't they just wipe us out?" Sam's mind never would be contained. The questions never do stop, John thinks. He should be proud of it, he reminds himself, impressed with his son, but even now, when Sam isn't challenging him, it raises his hackles. Not Lilly's though, she doesn't bat an eye. Rolls with it.

"Dead Man's Blood." She answers calmly. "Probably by accident, it was discovered that dead man's blood is toxic to them in small doses and lethal in larger ones. It's the perfect weapon. We can load it in ordinance, spray it in air around them, pour it on them straight. Whatever." She brushes her bangs out of her eyes, "It does the trick. And there's never a short supply."

"Mutual assured destruction." Dean mumbles, "Hence the treaties."

"Exactly." She agrees.

"So, they don't drink human blood, don't kill people. What's any of this got to do with us?" John asks.

Here her face grows serious and then he swears the air in the room chills a degree.


	8. Chapter 8

She explains everything she's found. Methodically, not missing a detail, and the room is silent except for her voice.

"You found six feeding sites?" John asks, almost incredulous.

"Yes." She looks confused by his confusion.

"In one night?"

Her expression turns weary and annoyed, "It's not that hard when they aren't taking care to clean up after themselves."

"How do you know?" John fires.

"These are textbook little vampire party sites. Foot prints. Bottles. Fires."

"That could be teenagers." He interrupts her again.

"…Blood Trails." She continues as if she hadn't heard him.

They go back and forth and thing that Sam can't understand is how she doesn't lose her mind and just yell at John. _Funny_, Sam thinks, _perfectly well and good for Dad to challenge and ask questions, but not me_. He finds himself chaffing and thinks that his face must give him away, because Dean shoots him a glare and interrupts, "So, back to the purebloods."

"At the spot with the burned out car, I found this." She reaches into her pocket and pulls out a little white pebble looking thing. "Fang." She presents it in her open palm. John picks it up and examines it.

"How do you know it's not from one of the rest of them? The halfbloods." John doesn't so much ask as pushes.

"Halfbloods don't have permanent fangs. They have a extra set of descending, deciduous sharp, pointed teeth. They look like snake teeth. This," she takes it back, shows them the human-ish shape, sharp and elongated, but definitely not animal, "is from a pureblood." Her face is concentrated on the small white tooth.

"So what does this mean?" Dean asks again.

"When we find the nest, we need to figure out which is the pureblood. We can't kill it until…"

John interrupts again, "We look for the toothless one."

She bulldozes him, not missing a beat, "…until I get permission from the Ruling Council and the Legacy. There has to be an execution order and a Daughter of the Order to carry it out or else its murder."

"Murdering Vampires?" John almost snorts.

"It's a violation of the Treaties. Which amounts to a death sentence for anyone involved." She looks at each of them, pressing them with the gravity of the consequences. "Summary execution. Fat lot of good the Colt will do you then."

"What's the Colt?" Sam and Dean ask in unison.

John, unsurprisingly ignores them, "So how do we get this execution order?"

"I need proof that pureblood killed a human or turned one against their will. It violates the Treaties and, just like us killing one of them without permission means a death sentence for us, feeding on unwilling humans means the same for a pureblood."

"Aren't they all unwilling?" Dean asks.

"You'd be surprised. They used to feed on us all the time, yeah? Most of their rituals, sacred rites, rites of passages etcetera still involve human blood and there is no shortage of willing humans lining up for the privilege. Familiars, if you will."

"Stupid." Dean mutters.

"Seriously." She agrees. Sam thinks that may be the first time.

"We don't need permission to hunt the halfbloods?" Sam asks.

"No. The purebloods don't care about them. As far as they are concerned halfbloods are infected humans and have nothing to do with them."

"Vampire racism?" Dean jokes. Sam notices the challenge is gone from his voice. The one that is normally there any time he talks to her. Progress, he hopes

"Actually, yes." Lilly smiles and turns her face in time to cut another volley of John's questions off at the knees.

"As for finding the pureblood, the tooth will have grown back by now." She gives him one of those wide eyed _OK?_ glances, "Still, he or she should be easy to spot. They'll be the head of the nest. And, I don't know how to describe it, they sort of…radiate power. You can't miss it once you've seen it."

"Look, John," She turns to the eldest of them and her voice changes to something reasonable, something placating without condescension, "You'll get it. I swear it. You'll just have to do it my way."

Sam can't help the snort that escapes him. Feels the full weight of three gazes on him. Manages to keep his mouth shut, but only just.

"I'm going to get some breakfast." Dean stands, breaks the tension. "Sam, give me a hand."

"I'm going to call William." Lilly also stands and Sam sees the dark circles under her green Dean-like eyes. So does John, apparently.

"When was the last time you slept?" His father asks.

"A couple of days ago. I was on nights before you called." She yawns.

"Get some shut eye, give me a list of what you need and I'll take care of it." Sam watches them stare each other down for a second before Dean tugs insistently on his sleeve.

As he closes the door behind himself and Dean, Sam hears Lilly's voice, low and cold, "Don't even think about it, Winchester. All you'll do is endanger them."


	9. Chapter 9

Lilly sleeps harder than she should. After fighting with John, reasoning with him, making him swear that he won't go after the vampires if he finds them, believing, after everything, that his word is worth shit, she still sleeps. She remembers calling Sam's cell, dragging the same promises from him, only slightly more convincing. She remembers going back to her room, knowing she couldn't stay awake any longer; remembers managing barely to call Sloane and check in, update him.

She told them to wake her at noon, but she can tell from the light that it's well into the afternoon and her stomach clenches immediately. She fumbles to the window and yanks the curtain aside, unable to calm her heart even when she sees the Impala, the truck and the rental, all there, side by side.

A shadow passes closer and instinct hurls her back away from the window. Her head whips around to the sound of the knock on the door. Sleepy cobwebs refuses to blow off and it takes her a second. _Vampires wouldn't knock. Wouldn't fight during daylight. Everyone is here. OK good. OK._ Her mind stalls. Another knock on the door. She shakes her head awake and makes her way to the keyhole.

John Winchester stands in the doorway. Tall and scraggly. Imposing. Looking nervous and holding a coffee. She opens the door a crack, adjusts the straps of her tank top and clears her throat.

"Yes?" She tries to sound like he hasn't busted her sleeping on the job.

"Coffee." He lifts it to her eye level. "Peace offering."

She unclasps the chain from the door and steps back. He hands her the coffee and she shows him to the cruddy little table, inviting him to sit. She catches him staring when she turns to take her own seat.

"That's a bit creepy."

"Sorry. You just…" John actually looks stunned, at a loss for words. "Your shouler...the tattoo. Your mother, she had…she said she got it in school."

Lilly doesn't know what to say to that. She thought they had an agreement, tacit, unspoken. Laura/Mary whatever, she doesn't come up. Ever. But the great John Winchester stands before her actually speechless, bewildered, looking, hurt, and she thinks back to facing her brother for the first time in an ER examining room six months ago, the bottom dropping out from her world and she throws him a bone.

"That's where I got mine." She turns her head, her back still to him, speaks flatly, quietly, "It's from Oxford. The rowing team, not the Legacy." _She didn't lie to you about that._

She's about to launch into a nasty little speech, wondering aloud why she should give a fuck about comforting this man, but the look of relief on his face just short circuits it. They'll be plenty of time for recriminations, she supposes. Makes more sense, strategically she thinks to herself, convinces herself, to keep the peace while the hunt is on.

"What time is it?" Her cellphone is on the nightstand.

"Almost five." John takes his seat across from her and she pulls her legs up into her chair, gratefully sips at her coffee.

"I slept ten hours? "You let me sleep ten hours?"

"You must have needed it. We tried calling you around noon, but you were pretty out of it." He smiles at her, kindly she thinks and she's surprised to find herself comfortable.

"I guess." She looks at him suspiciously, "What did you do while I was … out?"

"Research, mostly. Dean and I drove around trying to find more feeding sites. Sam was still hacking county records."

She stares at him with a look she knows works on liars. He doesn't flinch. "Honest." He raises his hands.

She continues to stare, "Why aren't you yelling at me for wasting a day?"

"You've got our backs, I'd rather you be sharp." He answers bluntly.

She keeps her gaze on him for another moment, then relents. "Fair enough." She drinks more heavily from the paper cup. It's bitter, worse than the stuff at the hospital, but she doesn't care. "Thank you for the coffee."

"Pretty awful, isn't it?" He smiles. He looks like Sam. Handsome. He might have had a kind face once.

"Vile, actually, but I'm used to worse. The rubbish in the ER keeps me alive."

Silence. Awkward. The kind where you could hear the clock ticking, if there had been one. John finally clears his throat, "The boys will be here in a second. Went for food across the street. We have some information, not much – _since we didn't go anywhere_." He leans heavily on the last phrase. "Except for the bar Elkins was at, the night he was killed."

She nods. She cocks her head to her side first and decides she believes him, but then she nods. The silence is becoming more and more oppressive, especially since they spend it trying not to stare at each other.

"How's Nick?" He ventures.

"Are you making small talk?" She regrets her disbelieving tone, tries to smile it off.

"I'm _trying_." He laughs a little.

"You rather suck at it." She jokes.

"I'm out of practice." He looks uncomfortable.

Oh god, she can't stand this. She can't understand why, but right this second she has no desire to be a bitch. She deliberately relaxes her shoulders. "Nick is fine, thank you. He's been a bit of a house husband since last month. He dislocated his shoulder on his last hunt."

"He's OK?" John sits up straighter.

"Fine. He'll be fine. I think he's enjoying just playing daddy."

"How old is Issabelle now?"

"She just turned two." Lilly smiles, gets up and walks to her phone. She flips it open and scrolls to some pictures of her, hands it to John.

"She's really cute." John's face actually lights a bit.

"She's a terrorist." Lilly purses her lips in mock seriousness and sits back down. "Right now her favourite game is 'testing mummy's will to live'."

John laughs, really laughs, "Dean was nightmare at that age. He got into everything. Dug in his heels, just 'cause he figured out he could. I don't think Mary or I slept more than two hours for a year." He stops when he realizes what he's said.

"What was Sam like?" She moves right through it, for her sake not his.

"Shorter." John chortles a little, smiles fondly, "He was stubborn, he wanted to know everything. He couldn't read yet, but he'd sit around pretending, with a book twice the size of him in his hands. He even managed to memorize it after a while. Dean used to read it to him every night until Sam started busting him about the parts he skipped."

They laugh, tension broken, but only for a second.

"Why are you being so nice to me?" It sort of slips out of her before she realizes.

He takes a deep breath, and says the very last thing she expects, "It wasn't fair, what we did. But we did the right thing. To protect you. All three of you. We tried to do the right thing to protect you."

"Protect us from what?" She demands, insists.

"The demon. The demon that killed your mother, that came for Sam that night."

Lilly's mute with rage, with fear, with such a disquiet coursing through her it almost makes her shake. In her life, she's honestly never wanted to know. Has ignored the why's of her mother's leaving. Accepted that she just didn't want her daughter, her life. Had made peace with it. But now…now. Before she can ask the any of the thousand questions ready to spring from her, John goes on.

"I need this gun, Lilly. I need to end this. For them. I want them to be safe. I want them to get on with their lives. And whether you believe me or not, I want them to know you. She would have wanted it."

"How the hell do you know what she…" Her rage flares like a fireburst, but it has nowhere to go.

Sam and Dean are at the door.


	10. Chapter 10

Through two large pizzas they narrow the search down to four old farm properties along or not far from the road where the feeding sites lie. John watches Mary's children work together, sort through data, argue about search priorities and it hits him again, the guilt, the uncertainty about whether he and Derek did the right thing. No fun for a man not used to second guessing himself.

Lilly sits with her back against the head board of one of the ratty beds. Her knees are pulled up and she rests with her elbows on them and the balls of her hands pressing into her eyes. She looks deceptively small.

His eyes flit between Dean and Lilly. It's hard not to look. He should stop dwelling, stop the pathological staring, but they're like a car accident he can't tear his eyes away from. It's more than the resemblance, there's an air about them. Something that marks them as belonging to each other. _Which is insane_, John thinks. They've known each other less than six months. Raised so completely apart, in such different worlds. Lilly is her father's daughter: educated, refined, wealthy. All he can boast as a father was providing them with the safety of military training and the security of the backseat of the same car for twenty years. _So much to regret and second guess_, John remembers.

"No." She snaps at Dean. John's missed the last few minutes of the conversation, lost in his thoughts. Dean's on his feet, pacing. Itching to fight. John recognizes the tension, the coil of his arms.

"Not at night." Dean must drive her as nuts as Sam drives him, John thinks to himself, but her voice is infinitely more reasonable. "We do not go after them at night. Not when they are at their strongest. Not when don't know how many of them there are, or which is the pureblood, or where to find them."

"Well how the hell do expect to find them sitting around here?" Dean challenges her.

"Is that what you think this is? Sitting around?" She asks. "In the last hour we've narrowed it to four likely spots. We know their feeding practices. We know they are sloppy. Unless they plan on showing up on the doorstep, arms up in surrender, we need intelligence, not testosterone."

"Dean." John's voice is a warning. "She's right."

His son slumps down on the bed across from Sam, across from his sister. Dean has never been one to sulk, but the look on his face is as close as he gets to it. Sam sits cross legged at the foot of the bed Lilly is on. How he can fold up his giant legs, John has no idea.

"So now what?" Sam asks. Uncharacteristically calm. John wishes…he doesn't know what he wishes. He wishes they were less alike. He wishes he hadn't thrown him out. He wishes he hadn't wasted the last four years, because god knows there probably won't be many more. He wishes he'd just stopped and shut up and hugged his boy. His Ivy League boy. He should have been proud of him. And he is. He's proud of his stubborn no bullshit son. Stanford. _Who would have thought?_. He wishes he had told Sam. He wishes Sam had never applied, had never put them all in that position, but goddamit, John was the grown up and he should have acted like one. He wishes for all the lost time. He wishes to have back everything they have ever lost. All of them.

John clears his thick throat and waggles the police monitor at him in response, "They haven't fed in a few days, if Elkins was the last. We wait."

"What if there's no car for the police to find? What if it doesn't get called into 911?" Sam's voice rises in a challenge and John's back tenses despite his musing. Reflex.

"Then we hit each of the four houses one by one during daylight." Lilly says without moving her hands from her eyes. She stretches a leg out and shoves Sam's knee with her foot. Sam shoves her foot back with his knee and John sees a faint smile, Mary's mouth, from underneath's Lilly's hands. He's jealous, if it admits it to himself, of the ease with which Sam calms in her presence. He's not the only one. He sees Dean's eyes dart to the contact between Sam and Lilly, sees his face harden, his eyes focus. Someone has stepped into Sammy territory and that is always a tricky thing for Dean.

_Here it comes_, John thinks. Dean doesn't do discomfort.

"So what do we do in the meantime?" Dean stands up and asks. "Sit on our asses while some other guy minding his own business gets made into dinner for these bastards?"

"Yes." She has a way of answering plainly that leaves not much room for retort he notices. Dean, though, has a way of getting in pretty much anyone's face.

"Not good enough." His oldest snarls.

"It will have to be." She stands in response, almost casually, but one hunter recognizes another and John knows there is nothing weary or casual about how she or Dean are holding themselves. His son is ready to get into it, but there is no question she is the leader here, "It will have to be someone else because I will not allow it to be one of you."

_Hit him in the family_, well played. John sits back and spares Sam a glance. They share a look that concedes they both just want to know how this will go. Sit back and watch the Dean and Lilly show.

"I can take four, maybe five of them on my own at a time. You guys, maybe one each. Maybe one for two of you. The nest will have at least eight or ten Halflings."

"Arrogant much?" He's in her face now.

"There is nothing arrogant about it. I know precisely what my limits are. It would take at least two of my kind to kill a pureblood. So do the math, a dozen Halflings and a pureblood. And, by the way, only if we get permission to take the pureblood. Which, so far, we have not. Which we won't even have a chance of getting until we get in there and find something that will get us the order. So think, roughly the equivalent of twenty of them. Not great odds for charging in half cocked are they?"

Dean knows he's wrong, but he has to give it to his kid, he stands her down.

"I'm sorry we can't prevent the next feeding. I am. But I will not risk one of you. End. Of. Discussion." She's giving as good as she gets. These two would make quite the team. _Will, some day_, John hopes.

"Discussion?" Dean does that thing he does just before the fists start flying: cocks his head to side, raises an eyebrow, raises the pitch of his voice just a note. Sam's eyes widen and John puts a stop to it before it goes too far.

"Stand down." He leans back in his chair, "both of you."

They spin their heads toward him simultaneously and it hits him again how much they look alike. Are alike. Like his Mary. And he has to force himself not to stare.

He takes a deep breath. "Lilly. Dean." John flips on the TV. "Save it for the vampires."


	11. Chapter 11

_This is why I left._

_What?_

_You heard me. This is why I left in the first place._

_That's right. You left. Your brother and me, we needed you but you left._

_You're the one who told me never to come back, you're the one who slammed that door._

It's like this for the twelve or so hours, since they picked up the police call. They spend the day following the vampire's trail and finally find the nest in semi decrepit farmhouse, an hour's drive from the Elkins place. The hours spent driving back and forth and searching are punctuated by Winchester skirmishes. Sam demanding answers. John demanding order. Lilly stays out of the way and just watches. What she sees is Dean. Dean mediating, Dean coddling, Dean alone, standing back, vibrating with impotent energy. He slips it on like socks: diplomacy, patience, invisible pleading.

They come back to the motel and wait for morning. Standing still turns out to be emotional gasoline. The fight starts to rev like an engine and in the last hour before daylight, the yelling starts again in earnest.

_You left. _

_You made me. _

_You deserted us. _

_I'm amazed you noticed. _

Back and forth and in circles for nearly half an hour.

"Are they always like this?" Lilly leans back against the counter in the dismal kitchenette and watches Sam and John verbally abuse each other some more. She'd be content to let them just scream themselves hoarse and mute, but something about the set of Dean's shoulders has her back up.

"Yeah." Dean's tone is clipped, he sounds like his throat is thick. His eyes follow his family and steadily his body grows more tense, his back stiffer, his muscles clenched. Waiting for something. How his tendons don't just snap under the pressure, sending pieces of him flying everywhere, Lilly has no idea. Would John and Sam even notice?

_We needed you._

_We? You. You! And you didn't need me, you needed a little soldier, a little robot._

_Your mother…_

_My mother what? Wanted this for us? Not even you can believe that._

The mention of their mother pushes Dean forward. "C'mon. Enough. It's almost light."

They ignore him and continue. On and on and on. Only now they toss Dean's name around like each has a special right to it. Like he's their own private army, ally, secret weapon. And that does it for Lilly.

She knows full well that just because she wants to help, doesn't make it her place, but enough is enough. John and Sam are drawing in Dean deliberately now. Each demands he take their side, while the both manage to ignore him at the same time. And Dean, it breaks her heart to watch Dean, try and stretch himself between them like a bridge, try to make them each cross and meet half way. His voice is a grown man's, his words border on angry and harsh, but Lilly hears it, a little boy, _just calm down, play nice, please stop_.

An unbidden, maternal, protective wave washes over her. She knows she isn't invited here, into this part of them. She knows her interference will set them back to the beginning, but someone needs to take Dean's side. She pushes herself up and stands beside Dean and his attention is so rapt, so focused on the youngest and oldest tearing strips off each other that he doesn't seem to notice. She feels him radiate distress, about to jump in. And she knows that if he does, he'll be the only one to get hurt. So before he can do it himself, in four fast steps, she is between Sam and John, in time to stop the inevitable exchange of blows this has come to.

"Enough." A roar louder than anyone would think possible out of someone her size escapes. One hand on each of their chests isn't enough warning for either of them, so when one steps toward the other, she has no idea which, she reacts instinctively, shoving hard and sending him flying ass first onto the bed a few feet away. She takes an instant to be grateful it is Sam. Embarrassing John is probably the worst thing she could do. Though shoving Sam wasn't her best move either if the look on Dean's face is anything to go by.

She decides the offensive is appropriate way to go here, "What the hell is wrong with you?" She turns on Sam first, since his rage is currently flat on its ass and John needs a second to calm down. "Are you twelve? Do you still need to make your point every time you open your mouth?"

Sam has no answer and Lilly spins on her heel before Dean can fill one in for him. "And you." She shoves her finger through the air toward John, "Would it absolutely kill you to hear him out? He's right. A lot of the time."

She turns back to Sam and Dean and Dean just stares at her expectantly. "What?" He snipes.

"Nothing! You're the only acting like a grown man." She blows her bangs out of her eyes and the room itself seems to wait for what happens next. It doesn't escape her that Dean drops her gaze immediately. It wounds her a little, so she presses on dripping sarcasm and barely restrained frustration, "While I appreciate you have _all sorts_ of unfinished business to attend to, it's been four years. You haven't spoken in _Four. Years_." Her eyes move back and forth between John and Sam. "Surely to God, after four years, this pissing contest can wait until we're finished here?"

No one moves, no one speaks, so Lilly charges on. "Good. So you," she turns to Sam, "go with Dean to my room and wait for me." Sam's face almost twists into defiance, but Dean hauls him up by the shoulder before it fully can.

Once the doors slams behind them she turns back to John,

"Don't even think about telling me how to deal with my children." John snarls at her through gritted teeth.

She spares barely a second to concede she wouldn't tolerate any interference in raising Issabelle, but knows backing down now means losing any ground she's gained. "_Your_ children are _my_ brothers," she hisses, "so unless you want to have _that_ fight right this second, perhaps you'll hear me out."

She takes the fact that he doesn't speak or move as permission to continue.


	12. Chapter 12

John is only quiet, he only lets her go on, because no, he's not ready to answer for his actions. He's not ready to justify keeping Sam and Dean and Lilly apart and, if he's honest with himself, he doesn't think there's any answer he'll give her that will satisfy anyone anyway.

"When was the last time barking orders at Sam actually worked?" His attention snaps back to her.

"What?" It's hard to concentrate, looking into Mary's angry eyes. Dean's. Dean never snaps back, never loses it, despite, John knows, wanting to more than once. This new dynamic throws him. He's unaccustomed to being this off balance.

"You heard me." Her arms are crossed across her chest. "Seriously, I'm not judging you and I'm not accusing. For Christ sake, I'm at the mercy of a two year old, most days. Just out of curiosity, when was the last time?"

The change in her tone softens him, without his realizing it at first. "Not since…" John actually thinks back over all the time since Sam hit puberty. Since he shot up taller than Dean, "not for a while." He concedes warily.

"Then why do you keep doing it?"

John launches into the same angry explanation he usually hurls at Sam, _no time to question orders, no place for debate, Dean understands, why can't Sam_.

"Oh bullshit." Lilly snorts.

"That's it." He begins to walk past her, but the grip of her hand around his arm as he passes is stronger than being trapped under a car. "Let go of me."

"In a minute." She's calm now, almost amused looking, which does the opposite of nothing. It makes him angrier, colours his vision more red. "What's that marine motto? The adapt and survive one?"

"What?" He hates, HATES, arguing with women. This zigzagging leaves him dizzy and frustrated. Rage to confusion to more rage to exhaustion.

"Improvise?" She asks again. She doesn't let go of his arm. "You know the one. It must have been drilled into you. So why don't you do it?"

He tries the immovable wall thing on her. The one that usually scares the crap out anyone he's facing down, but her grip is strong and he's not sure he'd ever want to meet the thing that intimidates a Daughter of the Order.

"Seriously, isn't it time to change tactics? At least with him? Isn't it fairly obvious the ship has sailed on your way of doing things? I can only imagine years of pouty faced insubordination from Sam. That boy is tenacious. Face it, it's never going to happen. He's never going to fall in line. So why do you keep doing it? _Strategically_ it doesn't make sense to me."

"I am NOT going to stand here and justify how I raise my children to you." But he does stand there. He can't tear himself away from those eyes. Or her grip for that matter.

"More bullshit." She finally lets go of his arm and sits herself down calmly, in the same chair and under the same light as the night he'd found her in his room in the first place. He wonders if dramatic staging is part of the Daughter training. "One, they're grown men. Two, you've been sending them on hunts own their own for months now. I think the raising bit is done, no?"

"This is so much easier with Dean." He huffs out a breath and slumps down on the edge of the bed across from her. He should just stomp off, he should just collect his boys and take off. But he can't. He's pulled toward her. And she's right.

"Not for him, I think." She stares at him. He ignores the last remark, hates that she sees so clearly. Hates that _she_ disapproves because it just reminds him of how absolute Mary's disapproval would be with what he's turned Dean into over the years. Most days, he gets so angry with Sam, fights back so hard with Sam, because he can. Because his youngest will give as good as he gets.

"You haven't even told them about the Colt." The disbelief in her voice is at odds with such poise. "I don't understand you. I don't understand at all how you conduct yourself or them." She shakes her head and puts up her hand to keep him quiet, "I appreciate it's none of my business. You've seen to making it none of my business. But you're the one who asked for my help. So there you are."

He takes a breath and her advice and changes tactics, opens himself to her, because he recognizes there's no chance he'll scare or bully her into shutting up. And because she's right. "They're my children, Lilly. They are all I have. They are the only thing in the world I care about and ever since your mother was killed…" His breath actually shudders, "I don't know how else to keep them safe."

Something, fear, doubt, sadness...something passes over Lilly's face. She reigns it in quickly and her face is like a still lake again in an instant, but when she opens her mouth to speak she stops and closes it again before she does.

"Wow." He tries to laugh, scrubs his hands over his face, "I left you speechless for a change."

She smiles though her eyes are distant. When she does speak, her voice is softer, "It terrifies me. Everyday, I think about it. About Issy doing what I do." She clears her throat and looks at him, and for a heartbreaking second he knows they understand each other. "I'm terrified I'll do it wrong. I'm terrified I'll lose her while I'm training her, that'll I'll drive her away, that I won't train her well enough," she takes a shaky breath. Seems like she's laying herself bare too and he appreciates it. "I think I know how you feel."

"I never thought about it like that." John concedes.

"Neither did I." She nods. Without realizing it, they've come to an understanding.

"So, now what?" He asks, "I'm too old, and this gun, it brings me too close to do things differently."

"Try." She looks at him with an open face, actually asking, "Try, because Sam won't change. He won't. And Dean," she stares at the door his sons left through, "I mean, I don't know him as well as… but he can't….I mean, I can't…," she clears her throat and sees her choose her words carefully, consider what she's saying, "I think he's more tired than he thinks he is."


	13. Chapter 13

"Is that him

"Is that him?" Dean whispers to Lilly. They lie, all four, side by side, behind a knoll on the hilltop overlooking the barn. Dean next to Lilly, Lilly next to Sam, Sam next to John.

They watch the nest assemble slowly as the sun comes up. Drunken, disheveled, rowdy and arrogant they drive up and stumble in. Each is greeted by one that Dean, he doesn't know how to describe it, one that hums with power, practically glows.

"That's him." Lilly breathes. "Bugger." Her voice is low and breathy and for just an instant, unhappily resigned.

"What?" John asks. _Asks_. Doesn't demand, doesn't bark. _Asks_. Dean has no idea what she said to him after ushering Sam out of the room, but John is calmer. Not humbled, not corrected, not anything other than the stubborn, commander of a father he's always known. But something has changed. In a short two hours, there has been relative peace between him and Sam; his father volunteered information about the Colt; _and_ he seems to be taking someone else's lead. And the most discomforting thing of all is that this is fine with Dean.

"You know him?" Dean asks her.

"Yes." She puts her head down on her hands for a second and blows out a breath. "I know him. Just a second." In the next moment she is composed again, snapping shots of the vampire with a cellphone, texting them to someone. "Bugger." Under her breath again. "OK."

"More to the point he knows me. He'll know my scent. That will be a problem." She looks at John. She turns her attention back to Dean, "I killed both his sisters."

"Great. This hasn't been enough of a challenge so far." His sarcasm, for a change, isn't meant to wound her. "So what does this mean?"

"It's safer for you to go without me." She doesn't look happy about it.

"Why? What do you mean 'killed his sisters'?" Sam interjects.

"The formal definition. I cut one of their heads off and I ripped the heart out of the other." She's matter of fact as though describing a fender bender. "His name is Luther."

Dean is turned toward her and can feel Sam and his father behind him, all waiting, just the tiniest bit more impressed.

"They were Esme and Sabina. Heirs to the House of Malgata. One of the more powerful of the vampire covens. The two sisters were ancient, over four hundred years old each. To make a long story short, hey went a bit mad with power and broke off to start their own covens. They took their beloved little brother," she motions with her chin toward Luther, "with them. Killed hundreds, turned dozens of people. Two generation of the Daughters spent most of our time vampire hunting. About 10 years ago we caught up with Sabina, it took six of us to kill her. Esme about two years ago, that took seven."

"And the house of whatever…they're pissed?" Dean ventures.

"They gave the execution orders." She purses her lips, "But no, their father, not so much in love with us. Me, in particular."

"So we have to be careful." Sam echoes Dean's thoughts.

"You have to be invisible. You go in, you get the gun, and you get out." Her stare bores into what Dean thinks is John's forehead. "No wetworks. None. Do not engage him."

"Does crazy run in the family?" Sam asks.

"No, actually. Esme and Sabina were mad. High strung like vampire poodles. Luther, Luther was the smart one. He's dangerous and careful. He's not in the least mad like his sisters were." She looks from one to the other to the next. "He is old. And powerful. And if he has any idea that I'm involved this, there will be a blood bath."

"We could use the Colt on him." Sam offers.

"No." John and Lilly's voices are in unison, even if, Dean knows, their motives are not.

"That gun is for the demon that killed your mother." He knows the steel of his father's voice. Feels Sam ready to strain against it.

"And we don't have an order yet." Lilly adds, more gently. "I sent those photos to the London House. We should have an order in a day or so. You get your gun and get the hell out.'

"What about you? We're not just going to leave you." Sam's body tenses behind Dean.

"Kristen, Sophia and a few others will join me here. Trust me, I won't go after him alone. But this needs to be done." Dean feels Sam about to speak, but she stops him, "Properly."

They are silent for a second, tight light guitar strings. Waiting. Then they aren't and Dean is grateful that they all seem to let out a breath together. Agreement. It feels like a luxury to him. "So, it's true, the daylight really doesn't hurt them…."


End file.
